[megafat]

The freeman posted:

Black Mesa can't be perfect with the fact that the hype will ruin the game for many people

I think that Duke Nukem: Forever being a terrible game ruined it. I'd rather the mod be know as good and disappointing than be know as terrible and be disappointing as expected.

[Chrille]

Marphy Black posted:

Because it's second-guessing Valve's creative decisions, an act made blatantly obvious by baselessly assuming these are "errors" to begin with. Do you think Half-Life was slapped together in a week by a bunch of clueless yokels? That seems to be the impression many people have now when they compare it to Valve of today, comprised of hundreds of employees and the King of Steam and all that. However, such a sentiment couldn't be farther from the truth. Back then, there were a number of remarkably talented individuals behind the scenes who were capable of developing a damn good game. And those people knew what they were doing.

The HEV suit was one of many ideas that went through several design iterations (read Raising the Bar, see Ivan), yet this is how we ended up receiving it. So yes, the HEV suit is supposed to look like it does. There were no accidents or mistakes made. It's meant to look like that because that's how Valve wanted it to look. The BMS team isn't Valve, yet they're making changes by the boatload as if the original developers can't be trusted, as if the source material means nothing to them, as if they know better than Valve did. I'm not claiming Half-Life is perfect and that it couldn't be improved, but at the rate Black Mesa is going, there's going to be a point one day when you'll take a step back looking at it all and wonder, "Is this still supposed to be Half-Life?"

That's a really fucking strange interpretation of it. Do you think the Black Mesa team is intentionally insulting Valve when making minor changes to their designs? Even if the look of the HEV is intentional (which it very obviously is) it doesn't mean it looks realistic or plausible that the torso-piece of the suit is a solid plate of metal. Gearbox realized it when they made the HD pack, Valve realized when they made HL2. I have Raising the Bar, and I know the design process, but despite that the design of the suit evidently wasn't perfect.

I don't know why you are so offended that the developers of Black Mesa take a realistic approach when redesigning things, in their own mod that is their own approach to the game, and you're exaggerating as shit when you say that it's going to look completely different to Half-Life. The suit still looks like a HEV suit, the turrets still look like Half-Life turrets, and most everything else looks the same as well.

[Marphy Black]

The freeman posted:

and it has to be like what Valve made it

By the team's own admission, Black Mesa is "remaking Valve Software's award-winning PC game, Half-Life." So as a matter of fact, yes, for them to achieve their goal, the output should indeed be quite "like what Valve made." Otherwise, wouldn't they be far off base?

[The freeman]

Marphy Black posted:

By the team's own admission, Black Mesa is "remaking Valve Software's award-winning PC game, Half-Life." So as a matter of fact, yes, for them to achieve their goal, the output should indeed be quite "like what Valve made." Otherwise, wouldn't they be far off base?

I could remake Half-Life in a sidescroller 3D Unity game based in the late 1400s as long as it maintained Half Life according to that goal.

Edited:

The HEV suit is like what valve made. The design is pulled from HL1 and HL2 with more functionality added.

[Lexic]

Marphy Black posted:

Because it's second-guessing Valve's creative decisions, an act made blatantly obvious by baselessly assuming these are "errors" to begin with. Do you think Half-Life was slapped together in a week by a bunch of clueless yokels? That seems to be the impression many people have now when they compare it to the Valve of today, comprised of hundreds of employees and the King of Steam and all that. However, such a sentiment couldn't be farther from the truth. Back then, there were a number of remarkably talented individuals behind the scenes who were capable of developing a damn good game. And those people knew what they were doing.

The HEV suit was one of many ideas that went through several design iterations (read Raising the Bar, see Ivan), yet this is how we ended up receiving it. So yes, the HEV suit is supposed to look like it does. There were no accidents or mistakes made. It's meant to look like that because that's how Valve wanted it to look. The BMS team isn't Valve, yet they're making changes by the boatload as if the original developers can't be trusted, as if the source material means nothing to them, as if they know better than Valve did. I'm not claiming Half-Life is perfect and that it couldn't be improved, but at the rate Black Mesa is going, there's going to be a point one day when you'll take a step back looking at it all and wonder, "Is this still supposed to be Half-Life?"

I'm sorry, but you're reacting like one of those neckbearded man children do when someone threatens the "purity" of their beloved anime characters.
They are not remaking half life 1 in HD, they are retelling half life 1 in modern graphics as they think it should be told. This is their personal interpretation. They are creating an entirely new game.
Did you shit your pants like this when Christopher Nolan tweaked Batman's suit in Batman Begins? Because this is exactly the same thing.

[SwissArmyKnife]

Marphy Black posted:

By the team's own admission, Black Mesa is "remaking Valve Software's award-winning PC game, Half-Life." So as a matter of fact, yes, for them to achieve their goal, the output should indeed be quite "like what Valve made." Otherwise, wouldn't they be far off base?

You're nitpicking small details and changes for the sake of performance and usability and saying they're shitting all over Valve's creative vision.

Valve and the people that work there, have grown a lot since Half-Life. If they were to remake HL today I guarantee you they'd change that damn suit. It's just an unrealistic design to begin with.

[sarevokh]

it's unrealistic but "iconic"... Or maybe you're this kind of people who like Christopher Nolan's movies just because they shot down all the "iconic" designs of Batman, and choose a realistic (and totally non-representative) view?

[SwissArmyKnife]

sarevokh posted:

it's unrealistic but "iconic"... Or maybe you're this kind of people who like Christopher Nolan's movies just because they shot down all the "iconic" designs of Batman, and choose a realistic (and totally non-representative) view?

It's still iconic. They literally didn't change anything other than adding realistic joints to it. At this point there's so many batman designs it's stupid to say he chose one that isn't true to batman or isn't iconic.

[sarevokh]

I should have chosen the examples of Bane design, Catwoman design, to illustrate more my argument.

I understand what you want to say, but still, I think realism should be sacrificed for the sake of eye-stroking concepts.

[testinglol]

Is this new() or am i

[Marphy Black]

Chrille posted:

the developers of Black Mesa take a realistic approach when redesigning things

Be careful with that method as it's quite the slippery slope. Take a "realistic" approach to redesigning everything in Half-Life and soon you'll end up with a bland, lifeless shooter that has had every bit of character ripped out of it.

Lexic posted:

They are not remaking half life 1 in HD, they are retelling half life 1 in modern graphics

Is this page out of date now like their Twitter? Because I still see claims that the mod is "remaking Valve Software's award-winning PC game, Half-Life" and will "remake the storyline used in Half Life into a new polished Source Engine version with new models, maps, soundtrack, voice acting and textures." Are they really "retelling" Half-Life now? Because that's an entirely new can of worms. By the definition of the word, that means Black Mesa would intentionally be far and away removed from the original. If that's the case, then I apologize. I was under the impression that Black Mesa was still a remake of Valve's Half-Life, not someone's personal idealization of the game.

SwissArmyKnife posted:

You're nitpicking small details

A bad decision is a bad decision, no matter how small. This wouldn't be the first time the BMS team has made such a questionable design choice (see: sentry model, two page ago). Build an entire mod on these "small" bad decisions and don't be surprised when the end result is similarly lacking.

[SwissArmyKnife]

sarevokh posted:

I should have chosen the examples of Bane design, Catwoman design, to illustrate more my argument.

I understand what you want to say, but still, I think realism should be sacrificed for the sake of eye-stroking concepts.

Oh no trust me, I hate the new Bane and Catwoman. There's definitely a time and a place for realism.

Marphy Black posted:

A bad decision is a bad decision, no matter how small. This wouldn't be the first time the BMS team has made such a questionable design choice (see: sentry model, two page ago). Build an entire mod on these "small" bad decisions and don't be surprised when the end result is similarly lacking.

Once again you're ignoring the reason they changed them. You're saying they changed them because they thought visually they looked better. They changed them because functionally they work better. Half-Life didn't have to worry about Physics so the sentries didn't have to worry about falling over. Hence the design change. Half-Life didn't have to worry about clipping because the models were so simple, Black Mesa's models are current generation and therefore have a good amount more detail which means things like giant metal diapers and plate tubes don't really work anymore. They'd either not move at all or they'd clip really badly.

Half-Life was not a good game because the turret didn't have pronged legs, or the HEV suit was a magically flexible metal suit.

[Chrille]

Marphy Black posted:

Be careful with that method as it's quite the slippery slope. Take a "realistic" approach to redesigning everything in Half-Life and soon you'll end up with a bland, lifeless shooter that has had every bit of character ripped out of it.

Realistic design that is in keeping with the look of the original game, I would like to change it to if you want to hang me up on that sentence.

Raminator posted:

It is the new sentry, and the similarities to the HL2 sentry are intentional. The original iteration fell over far too easily, wasn't directional and was impossible to aim and stand upright.

Seems like perfect reasoning to me as to why they would change the design of the turret. Care to mention any other questionable design choices, apart than the two we are discussing here, that will inevitably add up to the failure of this mod?

[Takuat]

Marphy Black posted:

The visor shape is based on and fairly accurate to the original HEV suit helmet. In fact, the whole helmet seems heavily inspired by Gearbox's PS2 version.

Sorry about being off-topic but where did you get the PS2 models from?

[nightlord]

SwissArmyKnife posted:

Oh no trust me, I hate the new Bane and Catwoman. There's definitely a time and a place for realism.



Once again you're ignoring the reason they changed them. You're saying they changed them because they thought visually they looked better. They changed them because functionally they work better. Half-Life didn't have to worry about Physics so the sentries didn't have to worry about falling over. Hence the design change. Half-Life didn't have to worry about clipping because the models were so simple, Black Mesa's models are current generation and therefore have a good amount more detail which means things like giant metal diapers and plate tubes don't really work anymore. They'd either not move at all or they'd clip really badly.

Half-Life was not a good game because the turret didn't have pronged legs, or the HEV suit was a magically flexible metal suit.

Several of the things they changed were that way on purpose - for example, the giant spinning fan. Black Mesa was not a perfect, safe, hi-tech research facility - it had large abandoned, badly maintained areas , unsafe sections and designs, places that served no purpose and it used old equipment beyond what they were intended to do. Changing those is wrong, as they are part of the story. Doesn't seem like they've changed the equipment too much though.

[Cone]

Marphy Black posted:

The visor shape is based on and fairly accurate to the original HEV suit helmet. In fact, the whole helmet seems heavily inspired by Gearbox's PS2 version.

It just seems too bug-eyed and curvy to me. I'd always imagined it as being flatter.

[Lexic]

Marphy Black posted:

Is this page out of date now like their Twitter? Because I still see claims that the mod is "remaking Valve Software's award-winning PC game, Half-Life" and will "remake the storyline used in Half Life into a new polished Source Engine version with new models, maps, soundtrack, voice acting and textures." Are they really "retelling" Half-Life now? Because that's an entirely new can of worms. By the definition of the word, that means Black Mesa would intentionally be far and away removed from the original. If that's the case, then I apologize. I was under the impression that Black Mesa was still a remake of Valve's Half-Life, not someone's personal idealization of the game.

English isn't the first language of all the developers and they may not know all the various nuances of each word. They are most definitely retelling and reimagining though, a quick browse through the available media (especially level design) would show you that fairly quickly.
Also:

FAQ posted:

What is Black Mesa?

Black Mesa is a total conversion of Half-Life 2, retelling the original game of Half-Life. Utilizing the Source engine and its endless array of possibilities and powers, Black Mesa will throw you into the world that started the Half-Life continuum and introduced Gordon Freeman, the gun-toting, bullet-dodging Ph.D. in Theoretical Physics. Check the "About the Mod" page for more details.

[TheDark[PL]]

Takuat posted:

Sorry about being off-topic but where did you get the PS2 models from?

Not really sure but I think they might be from the PC HD Pack which uses these PS2 models

[Chrille]

nightlord posted:

Several of the things they changed were that wayon purpose - for example, the giant spinning fan. Black Mesa was not a perfect, safe, hi-tech research facility - it had large abandoned, badly maintained areas , unsafe sections and designs, places that served no purpose, and it used old equipment beyond what they were intended to do. Changing those is wrong, as they are part of the story.

The giant fan is still there. It has been changed to make sense.

And just to clarify, the nonsensical places aren't so because of story importance, but because of graphical limitations. It's a general trend in games from the 90'es and early 00'es. Valve established very well which parts of Black Mesa were unsafe and old (and which were hi-tech) mainly through textural choices, as neither complex level geometry nor models wasn't too available.

Edited:

Textural choices that are in line with the theme of the chapter*

[nightlord]

Chrille posted:

The giant fan is still there. It has been changed to make sense.

And just to clarify, the nonsensical places aren't so because of story importance, but because of graphical limitations. It's a general trend in games from the 90'es and early 00'es. Valve established very well which parts of Black Mesa were unsafe and old (and which were hi-tech) mainly through textural choices, as neither complex level geometry nor models wasn't too available.

Edited:

Textural choices that are in line with the theme of the chapter*

What about things such as the conveyor belt room having no doors or ways in? That wouldn't of been due to limitations. Same with the Fan - it was that way for a reason.

[Chrille]

nightlord posted:

What about things such as the conveyer belt room having no doors or ways in? That wouldn't of been due to limitations. Same with the Fan - it was that way for a reason.

Yes, it was because of limitations. As a result of that, realism simply wasn't first priority, even for a game such as Half-Life that was perceived as highly realistic when it was released. You see like five doors you cannot use in the entire game and of which the only purposes were decoration. Are you telling me that people teleported to work in Black Mesa?

[Marphy Black]

Takuat posted:

Sorry about being off-topic but where did you get the PS2 models from?

I extracted the model from my own PS2 copy of the game for that screenshot. If you're looking for PS2 models to use in your own Half-Life, you could try Ambient.Impact's and Romka's models. If you're looking for more stuff than that, check out Half-Life Creations, namely this thread.

[Juniez]

contrary to popular belief, Valve aren't masterminds at everything and are capable of making less-than-stellar decisions

[nightlord]

Chrille posted:

Yes, it was because of limitations. As a result of that, realism simply wasn't first priority, even for a game such as Half-Life that was perceived as highly realistic when it was released. You see like five doors you cannot use in the entire game and of which the only purposes were decoration. Are you telling me that people teleported to work in Black Mesa?

Considering they lived there they would of just used the trams and then walked the rest of the the way. I don't remember seeing any non-accessible areas where people were intended to actually work. Any examples?

[Chrille]

nightlord posted:

Considering they lived there they would of just used the trams and then walked the rest of the the way. I don't remember seeing any non-accessible areas where people were intended to actually work.

That's some shit luck if you work in the Lambda sector, having to navigate all the way from Sector C through the abandoned parts of the facility. I mean, we don't see any other doors leading out of there apart from those huge blast doors they used to keep the invading Xenians out.

I would also have to applaud the hard working people at Black Mesa for being able to transport all the materials they used to build the Anti-Mass spectrometer with using only the tram. And all the places in Black Mesa were being worked in at some point, but using your logical they constructed a lot of shit for the apparent purpose of wasting money.

Fact is, when they built the levels of Half-Life, they included what was relevant to the player and in 9/10 of the cases nothing more than that, because that was all the computers of that time could handle. This was the case with every game released in that time period.

Edited:

I can't really believe you're actually arguing against that anyway

[The freeman]

Marphy Black posted:

Be careful with that method as it's quite the slippery slope. Take a "realistic" approach to redesigning everything in Half-Life and soon you'll end up with a bland, lifeless shooter that has had every bit of character ripped out of it.

Changing the HEV suit nearing the end of development makes Black Mesa a lifeless shooter with every bit of character ripped out of it?

[Hybrid 4F]

I'm okay with the changes on the suit, but can someone explain me what the fuck is this thing supposed to be? This looks horrible. It looks like a Strogg soldier from Quake.



This is the original concept art for Alien Grunt by Chuck Jones, why can't they use this? It still looks great.

[:smugspike:]

it's the girlyboy version of the alien grunts

Edited:

look at them legs ~~

[Marphy Black]

The freeman posted:

Changing the HEV suit nearing the end of development makes Black Mesa a lifeless shooter with every bit of character ripped out of it?

That is one good example you've got there, but you're only scratching the surface! Another example of Half-Life's design being diluted due to the onset of realism would be the removal of the HECU's PCV suits. Now they wear some generic green armor. I believe the BMS team also cut the balaclava that shotgun soldiers wear because this ruined the game for everybody or something.

The freeman posted:

nearing the end of development

Do you know something we don't? Please reveal your secrets.

[Mr. Someguy]

Marphy Black posted:

I believe the BMS team also cut the balaclava that shotgun soldiers wear because this ruined the game for everybody or something.

They cut it because of software limitations, everyone knows that. They have a choice, keep the unique face creation system, or end up with only six faces

[sarevokh]

Development is "finished", as far as we know, now.

I've really a strong feeling that if we get a copy of BMS right now, we should experience some glitches and bugs here and there, but overall this should playable from beginning to the end.

There is no more point in asking anything. This is all in Raminator's sick brain, now. It's like when Peter Jackson filmed the last scene of LOTR Return of the King : after such a long time working on it, he just don't want to leave the set any more.

A good psychotherapy can be useful, sometimes.

[Mr. Someguy]

sarevokh posted:

Development is "finished", as far as we know, now.

I've really a strong feeling that if we get a copy of BMS right now, we should experience some glitches and bugs here and there, but overall this should playable from beginning to the end.

There is no more point in asking anything. This is all in Raminator's sick brain, now. It's like when Peter Jackson filmed the last scene of LOTR Return of the King : after such a long time working on it, he just don't want to leave the set any more.

A good psychotherapy can be useful, sometimes.

On the contrary, Raminator has stated he's grown sick of the project and may even give up mapping forever once this is done.

[TheJoey]

Marphy Black posted:

Do you know something we don't? Please reveal your secrets.

if you scroll up or go back a page you can read for yourself that a black mesa team member has stated that the game is complete and has been ready for release... but the lead developer is holding it back for an unknown reason.

[Wilford Brimley]

cman2k has always been really secretive and has something like 279 posts (in the around 8 years the mod has been going)

[sarevokh]

Mr. Someguy posted:

On the contrary, Raminator has stated he's grown sick of the project and may even give up mapping forever once this is done.

For players' sake, it'll be the wisest decision he could ever take.

For following many mods over the years, I've seen everything on communication, it is particularly hard of course for amateurs to have ALWAYS a good communication between them and the fans.
It's not rare when some dev's snap and tell some people to go fuck themselves... We've seen with the (now dead) Retaliation, or with Rumpel and Minuit for Cry of Fear...

But, there are particular cases of mindfucking the fans :

-the first one is Raindrop : for months, one of the dev's tried to maintain the illusion that the mod was still in development, and the lead dev' didn't know anything. Suddenly, news were posted about a soon to be release demo... And the lead dev' realized everything at this moment and posted a hot comment on the moddb page, telling us how the mod was dead long ago, how he wasn't aware of the "news", and how this all went into a global mess...

That's the kind of communication Black Mesa has reached : for now, 2 developers and the webmaster hinted the completion and the release of the mod, only to be (at least three times) forced to go back on what they said and resulting once again in a comm' debacle.

A recurring argument on how BMS will be in the end, is that so many people have worked on it (because of departures and arrivals here and there) that it will be a massive clusterfuck with a schizophrenic gameplay.

Some people say we should stop worrying about the release date : the global consensus on a proper gestion of a mod/game is that usually news are posted, people are excited... then it goes quiet for a while, fans and dev's together going back to a "sleep" position... and then begins the new cycle.

The absence of "true news" about Black Mesa provoked a constant flood of excitation from fans and followers, never really reaching high peaks, but also never going lower than a certain level. It all resulted in a vicious circle of self-flagellation for fans and dev's in the same time.

EDIT : http://carlosmontero.com/about.php , about the "project leader" nobody hears about. For what I see, he's already a "pro"... Has anyone tried to mail him instead of Raminator or JKane or others?

Maybe he's more talkative, at least he seems more "mature"...

Maybe it's like Raindrop... Maybe BMS is dead and the other members try to maintain the illusion... Wow, mindfuck again...

[The freeman]

sarevokh posted:

For players' sake, it'll be the wisest decision he could ever take.

For following many mods over the years, I've seen everything on communication, it is particularly hard of course for amateurs to have ALWAYS a good communication between them and the fans.
It's not rare when some dev's snap and tell some people to go fuck themselves... We've seen with the (now dead) Retaliation, or with Rumpel and Minuit for Cry of Fear...

But, there are particular cases of mindfucking the fans :

-the first one is Raindrop : for months, one of the dev's tried to maintain the illusion that the mod was still in development, and the lead dev' didn't know anything. Suddenly, news were posted about a soon to be release demo... And the lead dev' realized everything at this moment and posted a hot comment on the moddb page, telling us how the mod was dead long ago, how he wasn't aware of the "news", and how this all went into a global mess...

That's the kind of communication Black Mesa has reached : for now, 2 developers and the webmaster hinted the completion and the release of the mod, only to be (at least three times) forced to go back on what they said and resulting once again in a comm' debacle.

A recurring argument on how BMS will be in the end, is that so many people have worked on it (because of departures and arrivals here and there) that it will be a massive clusterfuck with a schizophrenic gameplay.

Some people say we should stop worrying about the release date : the global consensus on a proper gestion of a mod/game is that usually news are posted, people are excited... then it goes quiet for a while, fans and dev's together going back to a "sleep" position... and then begins the new cycle.

The absence of "true news" about Black Mesa provoked a constant flood of excitation from fans and followers, never really reaching high peaks, but also never going lower than a certain level. It all resulted in a vicious circle of self-flagellation for fans and dev's in the same time.

EDIT : http://carlosmontero.com/about.php , about the "project leader" nobody hears about. For what I see, he's already a "pro"... Has anyone tried to mail him instead of Raminator or JKane or others?

Maybe he's more talkative, at least he seems more "mature"...

Maybe it's like Raindrop... Maybe BMS is dead and the other members try to maintain the illusion... Wow, mindfuck again...

So they put out the effort to actually post new screenshots, give Atomic a build of the game, and provide feedback to quite a few people while maintaining a website, forum, and chat.

[megafat]

TheJoey posted:

if you scroll up or go back a page you can read for yourself that a black mesa team member has stated that the game is complete and has been ready for release... but the lead developer is holding it back for an unknown reason.

It's because he forgot how to upload a file.

[Konti]

Wilford Brimley posted:

cman2k has always been really secretive and has something like 279 posts (in the around 8 years the mod has been going)

Pro-tip: check devs' "join date". Their forum crashed in May 2009.

[ShaunOfTheLive]

Hell-met posted:

what are they doing

going full Duke Nukem (you never go full Duke Nukem)

[WillerinV1.02]

Mr. Someguy posted:

They cut it because of software limitations, everyone knows that. They have a choice, keep the unique face creation system, or end up with only six faces

thanks man
Now I have like 16 tv tropes tabs open
you knew this would happen
screw you buddy